


Blood, Sweat, and Bones

by closemyeyesandleap



Series: By Her Grave [3]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, Coulson (mentioned) - Freeform, Episode: s05e19 Option Two, Gen, Team (mentioned)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-28
Updated: 2018-07-28
Packaged: 2019-06-17 15:40:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15464670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/closemyeyesandleap/pseuds/closemyeyesandleap
Summary: Digging up Jiaying's body gives Daisy far too much time to think.





	Blood, Sweat, and Bones

**Author's Note:**

> This is my third work in a collection about times Daisy visited Jiaying's grave. As before, it is not necessary to read "In Loving Memory" and "Goodbye" before reading this one, but reading them in order does add a bit of context to some of the allusions.

“Nothing’s impossible. It’s one element. What is it?” Daisy asked.

“All I got was the name of some place where they found it, and I can’t find it on any map.”

Daisy took the folder from Tony Caine. She sucked in a breath, feeling as though the air had been knocked out of her. Besides some meticulously copied Chinese characters, she saw a hastily scribbled _Qiu Jiaying - flourishing hills???_

She let out her breath in a sigh. “That’s cause it’s not a place.” 

Tony grinned. “So you know where to find it? Well, look at that, a lucky break!”

“Just one thing, Candyman.” Daisy grimaced. “I’m going to need you to get me a shovel.”

* * *

It was the last place Daisy had expected to end up on this brief excursion from the Lighthouse. The cemetery was as she remembered it, though a bit darker. The streetlights that had been flickering during her last visit had completely been extinguished. It appeared the city had been neglecting the surrounding neighborhood. Good. She was still a wanted fugitive after all, though if what Tony was saying about New York was as serious as he sounded, she had probably dropped a bit on the list of priorities.

Daisy turned on the flashlight and walked quickly to the grave she was seeking. Catching a glimpse of the name _Jiaying Johnson_ on the grave, she threw down the duffel bag and took out the shovel.

She slammed the shovel into the ground, not allowing herself to think about what she was doing. Over and over again she plunged the cold metal into the colder ground, trying to lose herself in the rhythm. _For Coulson. For Coulson._

For Coulson, Daisy was prepared to do anything. He was the one who had found her when she was alone, who had taught her that her life had meaning, that she could help people. He was the one who held her when she discovered her father’s cruelties. He was the one who had stood by her side when she buried her mother. He was the one who hadn’t stopped looking when she ran away, when she thought herself unlovable, and who welcomed her back without even an ‘I told you so.’ And he was the leader the team needed. Not her. 

_For Coulson. For Coulson._

After an hour of constant digging, Daisy through the shovel aside in frustration as she stared at the hole, still shallow at barely two feet deep. She’d had enough. Who cares if someone heard the commotion and called the cops or the National Guard? Good riddance. She could use a good fight, anyway. Daisy flung out her hand, preparing to quake it open the rest of the way—and shot her hand back as if electrocuted, as she was hit by a sudden, nauseating wave of deja vu.

_Hive stood over her, a look of grim satisfaction on his face, as she blasted the ground open to disinter the Kree device that James had buried._

Daisy lunged for the shovel. She picked it up and stabbed it over and over and over into the dirt below, trying to shake the image of Hive from her mind. The memory of Hive had knocked her from the carefully constructed trance of her earlier digging, and she grunted as she shoveled. 

Sweat gathered at her brow and around her hairline and began to trickle down her face and neck. She winced as the salt of her sweat stung the wound on her neck. As she dug, her collar scratched against the wound, rubbing it open. Daisy realized it had begun to bleed again as she felt the warm presence of blood mingling with the cool sweat.

She made no move to remove her jacket, no move to stop digging. In a way, she relished the pain. It pushed the image of Hive from her mind.

For a moment.

Until the pain replaced Hive with wounds that were just as painful and far more fresh.

With every plunge of the shovel, with every scratch of her collar, she felt Fitz’s scalpel at her neck again. Anger and sorrow rose in equal measure within her as she dug. 

It kept happening.

It wouldn’t stop. 

Not until the worst happened, the unthinkable.

Piece by piece, moment by moment, the last opportunities that she had to maintain some semblance of control, to keep her team, her family, her world safe were torn from her hands. 

Stay behind to save the world? 

Her choice didn’t matter.

Keep the inhibitor in to prevent a future that was seared into her memory like a brand?

Her choice didn’t matter.

Lead the team in a way that might, somehow, avert disaster?

None of it mattered. 

Daisy jumped into the deepening hole and continued her relentless digging, the argument from earlier ringing into her mind as her hands blistered and her neck bled. Their faces flashed in her memory: Jemma’s dismissive glance, Fitz’s adverted gaze, YoYo’s furious glare.

As much as she tried to shut off her thoughts, her mind replayed the scene over and over as she dug.

Her team. Her family.

_We didn’t pick you! Coulson made that decision and brought you back when he could have broken the loop right there!_

YoYo was right, of course. Hadn’t that been Daisy’s plan?

She just would have assumed that the team would mourn. 

That they would beg and plead and insist there was another way.

It was never supposed to be the easy option.

Well, fine. They could think whatever they want of her, of her presence, of her leadership.

Nothing mattered now but Coulson.

Nothing mattered but––

Daisy was wrenched from the Lighthouse back to the cemetery by a loud clang as the shovel collided with the outside of the coffin. She shoveled around the coffin, exposing the entire lid. Now deep in the hole, she grabbed the duffel from the ground above. Before she could think, she unclasped the lid and threw open the coffin.

Daisy shuddered and turned away, pressing her face to the cold dirt walls of the hole she had dug, not caring that the dirt turned to mud as it mixed with her sweat. She fought down the nausea that rose in her throat. She turned and glanced at the skeleton again. Her fingers tingled with the urge to shoot small quakes into the ground and send herself flying into the sky, away from the scene in front of her.

Daisy bent over the skeleton, and with trembling hands, collected the remains of her mother into her arms and gently inserted it into the duffel. She tried not to notice as her fingers struggled to remain still long enough to zip the bag back together.

Once, years ago, she had been confronted with the choice between Coulson and her mother, and she had made the wrong choice. 

Not again. Not now.

If saving Coulson was the last choice left to her, well, it was the choice she was going to make.


End file.
